The Scenic Route
by Isilien Elenihin
Summary: Rose Tyler has made her way into the right universe but everything isn't hunky-dory. Her Dimension Canon is broken and she's stranded in the wrong time on a backwater planet with little-to-no hope of procuring the parts she needs to fix her transport and find the Doctor-until she runs into a rather disreputable Captain and his crew. Prequel to 'The Long and Winding Road.'
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Nothing you recognize belongs to me!

WARNING: If you've read 'The Long and Winding Road' (and if you haven't go do so) than you know that my take on Rose Tyler includes a period of torture/experimentation spanning roughly a year and followed by several decades of hiding. This story deals with torture and its effects, including PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder). There may be graphic descriptions in flashbacks and dream sequences. I will tag each chapter appropriately, but I wanted to give you all a head's up first.

* * *

The midday sun hammered down on the dusty street of Da Hui Lang spaceport. It was a dump of a place on a dump of a planet in a miserable excuse for a solar system. The buildings, loosely called 'offices' needed to be burned down and rebuilt, the signs could barely be read, and the ships that populated the landing pads looked almost as derelict as the buildings. In other words it was the perfect place for someone looking to get the hell out of dodge, which was exactly what Rose Tyler wanted to do.

At first it had been exhilarating, being back in her original universe. The Dimension Canon had confirmed it and the lack of zeppelins had sealed the deal. She'd managed one trip to the factories of Villenguard (pre-Doctor, of course) and she'd never been so grateful that Jack liked to go on about the superiority of fifty-first century weapons to sonic screwdrivers—but she'd been interrupted. Rose had barely managed to shift in time and crossing the Void had taken its toll. The Dimension Canon sat on her wrist, very nearly useless. The Spatiotemporal stabilizers were shot, and without them she couldn't jump. If she tried she would be flung into the Vortex without an anchor and she would remain, adrift, until she died.

So she was stuck in the twenty-sixth century, on one of many hunks of rock in the outer orbits of a star with the rest of the human race. It was less than ideal. The technology was decidedly better than twenty-first century closer to the inner, or core planets, but it was still thousands of years (and several cultures) away from what she needed to fix the Canon. Most of the parts had been adapted from alien devices—aliens which had been everywhere in the twenty-first century, and strangely lacking in the twenty-sixth.

What she needed was a Time Agent. A Vortex Manipulator would provide her with the parts she needed and then she could leave this backward, unpleasant time behind her. However, in the two and a half years she'd spent traveling from rock to rock she hadn't caught even a trace of Time Agent activity. The Canon would alert her to their presence. She remembered World War I, and she'd insisted that the engineers include the ability to scan for time-traveling tech. So far the Canon had registered nothing.

A sardonic grin twisted her lips. Well. She had nothing, if not time. But not on this planet, not anymore. She'd been here for five months and the dust settled on her jacket like manacles, pulling her down. The atmosphere seemed to suffocate her—the heat and noise and smell. She wasn't an earthbound thing, not even after decades of forced planetside residence. She was a creature of the stars; she had been ever since she took his hand, ever since she felt the Earth turn beneath them.

Her throat burned, from the heat and the dust and the memories that swelled up as they always did when she thought of Him. The feel of his hand in hers, so different each time but both fitting perfectly, the way he always smelled like himself, even when it was books and tea instead of engine grease and leather, the way he could look at her with brown eyes or blue and see directly into her soul. The way he looked on the beach—fragile, damaged—alone.

"Are yah plannin' on buyin' a ticket, or are yah just gonna stand there'n stare at it?" a rough voice intruded on her thoughts. "Cause if yah aren't there're others who will." The man who addressed her was tall, well built, but surly-looking. He carried an unnecessary number of guns, in Rose's estimation, but she was sure he was well-versed in their use.

"Jayne, are you being rude to a potential customer?" The newcomer, another man, shot Jayne a warning look.

"Naw, Mal, she's just hangin' around gawpin' at Serenity," Jayne replied in a tone Rose knew well. Tony had mastered it when he was five.

"My name is Malcom Reynolds," the new man continued, "and this is my ship, Serenity. Were you looking to book passage?"

Rose studied him. He was shorter than Jayne and a bit wider, but his clothes were also cleaner. He looked a bit like a cowboy, but he had a good coat. The Doctor had taught her the value of a good coat. And his ship, while older, was a Firefly. Keep those in good condition and they'd run forever.

She held out her hand. "Rose Tyler. And yes, I'd like to book passage on your ship, Captain Reynolds."

He shook her offered hand. "We're bound for Persephone, but we stick to the outer rim, mostly."

"Works for me." She cocked her head. "How d'you feel about long-term passengers? I'm lookin' for a friend."

He eyed her suspiciously. "You aren't a bounty-hunter, are you? 'Cause I don't do prisoners. We're a cargo ship, primarily, an' prisoners take up too many resources and cause too many headaches. T'aint hardly worth my time. An' I don't do corpses either. Tends to smell up the place and it's close quarters when we're in the black."

Rose laughed. "No, no I'm not. He's a friend, we just got—separated." She held up her purse. "I can pay, in advance." Captain Reynolds named a price she knew to be substantially higher than usual. She opened the purse and counted out exact payment. His face was perfectly neutral as she dropped the cash into his palm. "Well, Captain?"

He glanced at the money in his palm, and then closed his fingers over it and slid his hand into his pocket. "Welcome aboard, Ms. Tyler. Jayne!" he called back to the surly man. "If Kaylee's got her head out of the engine have her show Ms. Tyler to a bunk. Zoe and I have business in town." Captain Reynolds tipped his hat to her and then strode out into the hot, crowded street. An elegant, graceful black woman followed him—Zoe, Rose assumed. The woman glanced at her appraisingly and the hairs on the back of her neck quivered. She was a predator, and like recognized like. She would not want to face Zoe in a fight if she could help it.

Jayne, meanwhile, was hollering up the ship's ramp. A few seconds later a cheerful, brown-haired girl scampered out. "What's all this, then?" she asked, hands on her hips. "Captain said the rest of the day was mine, so long as I fixed that coupling and it is fixed, he saw himself."

Jayne grunted noncommittally. "Picked up a passenger an' Mal wants you to get her settled."

Kaylee, as she could be no one else, glanced at Rose and her pugnacious fire seemed to vanish. A smile wreathed her face and she was lovely, even with engine grease smeared across her cheek. "Oh, hello! I'm Kaylee Fry!"

"Rose Tyler." She hefted her bag—a good, canvas backpack. It had everything she needed, everything she owned. She'd learned to travel light. It was hard to disappear when you had a house or a pet or an excessive number of shoes, after all. "Lead on."

* * *

Kaylee was sweet, Rose thought as she followed the younger girl through the bowels of the ship. It was powered down now, but she thought that when the engines were going it would hum nicely. She missed that, the sound of the TARDIS, the soft vibrations she could feel in her bones. They seemed to change frequency and pitch with the Doctor's (or perhaps the ship's) mood. She wasn't sure where the humming came from, but it was comforting and familiar, as was the metal grating beneath her feet. She was so close, so close to escaping. She could feel the excitement building, the old thrill that had accompanied each of their adventures.

The Doctor was out there somewhere, and she'd get back to him even if it took her decades.

* * *

Once Wash, their pilot, had taken them into the black Mal had introduced the crew to her. She'd met Jayne already, and Kaylee. Also traveling with the crew was a Shepherd named Book. He seemed like a kind, gentle man and Rose liked him almost immediately. He had a way of setting a person at ease she thought must be natural. It was hard to fake people-skills like that. Wash was friendly too, but he was Zoe's husband and Rose could read the possessiveness in the black woman's eyes. She kept her flirting to a minimum. They had a doctor as well, which surprised her. Simon Tam was a soft spoken, elegant young man—and he was handsome to boot. Rose didn't miss the way that Kaylee's smile softened when Simon stepped forward, or the awkward hitch to his conversation when he noticed she was watching. Had she and the Doctor been so obvious? Mickey's reaction to traveling with them and his choice to stay in Pete's World said yes. Her mum's insistence on their status as a couple agreed. Pity. Apparently she was the only person who didn't know, much like the two before her.

When Mal introduced Inara Serra Rose thought her eyebrows might hit the roof. She'd run into companions before but never on a ship like Serenity. The others she'd believe, even the doctor—but then, everyone was running from something. These people were lucky enough to be running together. Inara was lovely, of course, and cultured and clever and far too observant for Rose's taste, but then she was a companion. She was trained to be all of those things. Her questions were pleasant but Rose caught the veiled probes. They had every reason to be suspicious. Passenger fare wasn't much and neither was cargo. If Captain Reynolds wanted to keep his ship in the air he'd have to find some pretty creative ways to earn cash. She'd lay odds that they'd done a fair bit of smuggling. He didn't strike her as the type to sanction unnecessary killing, which ruled out a career as a hit squad or band of enforcers. He was too independent to tolerate being under anyone's boot, that ruled out organized crime, and she doubted that a Shepherd (at least one with convictions as strong as Book appeared to have) would travel for an extended period of time with anyone who condoned serious violence.

So. She was riding along with a crew of potential smugglers with no love for the Alliance. Rose smiled. She could work with that.

* * *

_The cement wall of the claustrophobic cell was cold against her back and the cement floor was cold against her arse and the soles of her feet. She shivered and wrapped her arms more tightly around her legs and rested her chin on her knees. Her breath made a cloud of fog in front of her face. She was a thing now, not a person, and things did not need heat. The only reason she wasn't freezing was that her prison was connected to the main building, the part where people were—and people needed heat. _

_ She shifted and winced. Wet warmth oozed down her side—she'd pulled the stitches just a bit too hard and the wound was open again. The cold made her bones ache and sent pins and needles through her arms and legs but if she tried to move, to keep herself warm, she bled. Bleeding meant more 'doctors' who weren't the right Doctor. Bleeding meant more knives, more pain._

_ Her arm throbbed. They'd stolen everything: her career, her family, her life—even her name. God, she hadn't heard her name in so long. All she had was a number now, burned into her arm three inches above her elbow so that everyone could see that she wasn't a person. She was different. She was _wrong_. She was a resource to be exploited. She was a puzzle. She was a threat. _

_ "Rose," she murmured into the still air. She was Rose. She was born in 1987 to Pete and Jackie Tyler. She grew up on the Powell Estate, and when she was nineteen years old she met a man who wasn't a man, an alien who called himself the Doctor. When she was twenty-one she lost him. She had a mum and a dad who were dead and a little brother who was somewhere out there. She would not forget. _

_ She pressed one finger against the oozing wound in her side. It came away red. Gently she dabbed it on the wall next to her. 'Rose,' she wrote out in blood. 'My name is Rose.'_

* * *

She jerked awake. One hand flailed out and slammed against something metal. Rose bit back a curse and forced herself still. The wall, she'd hit the wall. A low hum hovered the in the background of her hearing and gentle vibrations radiated from the metal surface next to her. Gradually her heart ceased pounding and her breathing slowed. It was dark because it was the night cycle. The space was small because she was onboard a ship. It was cold because Captain Reynolds saved money by keeping the environmental controls just under standard. That Torchwood was behind her now. They were whole universe away—they couldn't hurt her now. Rose's fingers curled around the butt of her trust psychokinetic wavelength extrapolator. No one was going to hurt her like that, not ever.

"They come for you at night, the men with knives," someone said from the vicinity of the foot of her bed. In two seconds flat Rose was up and out, standing next to the cot with her gun pointed at something.

"Who's there?" she demanded.

The lights flickered on. A girl was sitting on her bed, an unfamiliar girl. She was thin, almost waifish, with brown eyes and hair. She stared at Rose, completely calm, seemingly unconcerned with the weapon aimed between her eyes. "They cut you in your dreams. Piece you apart and put you back together, try to find what makes you _you_."

Rose lowered the gun slowly. "How do you know that?" she asked. "And what are you doing in my bunk?"

"I can hear you when you're sleeping." The girl studied Rose as if she was a particularly difficult puzzle. "You're quiet when you're awake, just a murmur, like a brook—but you're an ocean when you sleep." She tilted her head to the side. "There are monsters in the darkness. Sharks and krakens and wolves."

"I thought I met everyone earlier," she said when the girl was silent for a while, and slid her gun back beneath her pillow.

The girl smiled. "Simon worries too much. He can't tell the difference between a wolf and a snake." She held out her hand. "I'm River—except when I'm not."

"Rose," she said, and shook the offered hand.

River released her and drifted towards the door. "Remember," she said before she slipped away. "Roses have thorns, wolves have claws—and girls have guns."

* * *

River was at breakfast the next morning cycle. Rose was up early—a legacy of her time at Torchwood and subsequent status as a fugitive; she needed little sleep. Too much and she would dream and _that_ was to be avoided at all costs. She understood why the Doctor ran now—if she could only run far and fast enough perhaps she could leave her nightmares behind.

Shepherd Book was also awake. He smiled and greeted her pleasantly, and set her to work. She didn't mind. She liked being useful. There wasn't much that could be done about the food; it was protein bars and runny egg substitute and artificially flavored juice packets—basically anything that could be bought cheaply that wouldn't spoil. Real food—flour and sugar and eggs and fruit and vegetables—was expensive and more difficult to maintain. The Doctor had taken her to ships in the future that would contain whole forests, oxygen factories, he called them and hydroponic gardens that were used to grow their own produce. Some of them even kept cows and chickens on board for fresh milk and eggs—but that was centuries in the future.

Still, she did her best and formed the slices of protein bar into something that resembled a sausage patty. She added a bit of her own spices, a blend that reminded her of home (and cost an arm and a leg to procure, but food was worth it).

Most of the crew, it seemed, tended to be late risers. Rose and the Shepherd worked in quiet harmony. She relished silence after the non-stop noise that accompanied being planet-bound.

"You're quiet now," a voice commented at her elbow.

It was reflex and probably all her fault, Rose realized. She'd gotten lost in her thoughts and dropped her guard—and she did not respond well to being startled. She whirled around, her fingers shifting on the knife from slicing to stabbing position. Wide brown eyes looked up at her and her breath burst out of her in a loud exhale.

"River," Rose acknowledged with a frown. "Don't _do_ that. If you're gonna be behind me, make some noise, something. Let me know you're coming."

"Sorry," the girl mumbled. "I forgot."

Book was watching the exchange with a great deal of interest. "I thought Simon told you to stay in your room," he noted with a raised eyebrow.

River rolled her eyes and flounced over to the table. "It's boring in my room. I've calculated the area and measured all of the walls and recited Pi to the 200th digit." She ran her hand along the worn wooden surface of the table. Real wood—it must be special. "Simon worries too much. There are no snakes on board Serenity." She grinned at Rose then, as if they were sharing a joke. "Only wolves."


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Nothing you see belongs to me! WARNING: Violence and torture mentioned.

* * *

Kaylee closed her eyes and took a deep breath. The marketplace was bustling around her. A spice merchant's stall was just ahead and the rich aroma of cinnamon and cloves filled the air. Unlike most of the Rim planets _Serenity_ tended to visit, Persephone was cool. Kaylee didn't object. She spent most of her time on _Serenity_ in the engine room. It was her favorite place to be—but it was hot. The wind danced across her skin and brought with it the less-pleasant aroma of the livestock stalls and Kaylee's nose wrinkled as she opened her eyes. Best not be forgetting the reason she was planetside. It was her turn to stay with the ship, but Mal had overruled the usual order and made Simon stay so that she could follow Rose.

Mal didn't trust their latest passenger and Kaylee couldn't understand why. Sure, she was quiet, but she was real nice. Sad, sort of, when she thought no one was looking, and she got on with River. _That_ was an accomplishment. Kaylee squeeled at Simon's sister well enough, but sometimes River gave her the creeps. She squeeled at River better after the girl outsmarted Jubal Early, but still—there were moments when it wasn't a girl staring out through River's eyes, it was something else. Something cold and empty and terrifying. Something that could kill without a second thought, with as much ease as it breathed.

Okay, so _maybe_ Kaylee could see why Rose's friendship with River was worrisome, but did she really need someone watching her? She hadn't done anything suspicious—just wandered through the marketplace. Kaylee had coin in her pocket and it was making her fingers itch. She hadn't had strawberries since that ball with Inara and there was a stall just a few back piled high with 'em.

An arm wrapped around her waist roughly and the cold, sharp edge of a knife pressed into her neck. She froze.

"That's it, little rabbit," a voice grated in her ear. "Not a sound, or I'll slit your pretty little throat."

* * *

Rose looked at the Dimension Cannon on her wrist for the hundredth time and sighed. Nothing. Not a whisper of a Time Agent. There were some odd traces, might have been the TARDIS, but she couldn't tell without a fully functional Cannon. Persephone was more advanced than the other planets she'd checked, but apparently it wasn't enough. Time Agents squeeled at flash, Jack had said. They like beautiful people and interesting places (and apparently almost everyone qualified as 'beautiful' in the 51st century). No matter. She had plenty of coin. She could travel for at least a year before she was in danger of needing to stop—and it was good to be _moving_. She couldn't stand being still.

Rose glanced back over her shoulder at Kaylee. The girl had been following her ever since _Serenity_ touched down. It was Mal, it had to be. The Captain was just a bit suspicious. He had good instincts. She was dangerous, after all, but not to them. Not unless they harmed her first. She frowned. Kaylee was gone. She'd been just there, by that stall with the spices—that stall that was just in front of an alley. Cold climbed up her spine and settled in her stomach. Kaylee was sweet and knowledgeable as hell about engines, but she wasn't a fighter.

How long had it been since she'd last seen the other girl? A few seconds? Long enough, she knew, for it to be a body she found in the alley. Rose pushed through the crowd of people. They swarmed around her, impeding her path, pushing her back. She wanted to scream, but she knew that wouldn't get her anywhere. Kaylee could be _dying_, and she didn't deserve that. Very few people actually deserved death and Rose was almost certain that no one on _Serenity_ qualified.

When she rounded the corner into the shadows of the alley a few seconds later Rose almost wanted to laugh. There were two thugs; one held Kaylee still with a knife against her throat while the other went through her jacket. Kaylee's eyes were wide and she was breathing fast, but she was alive. Rose could work with alive. She didn't relish the thought of returning to _Serenity_ and explaining to Mal how he'd gotten his engineer killed by having her follow Rose.

She kicked a pebble deliberately. It ricocheted off one of the metal bins that littered the alleyway and the thugs jerked around.

"Rose!" Kaylee choked out, and the boy holding her pressed the knife more tightly against her neck. He was going to cut the skin, Rose noted. A sort of calm settled over her but she did her best to appear small, vulnerable, frightened. Scum like them, they wouldn't dare pick on someone their own size, someone they knew might fight back.

_Chopin's __Nocturne in C Minor, Op. 48, No. 1__ was playing in her head. Rose knew it was Chopin because Maria always listened to Chopin during surgery—even when that surgery was cutting into someone who used to be a friend. There was blood on the white walls, so much blood. They squeeled at the paralytic—she didn't thrash when they cut into her, but remained fully conscious so they could determine her pain threshold. She could feel blackness at the edge of her mind and she hoped it would wash over her—anything, anything at all to make the pain stop._

Her hands curled into fists as a thin trickle of blood wound down Kaylee's neck. The thugs leered at her, and the second gestured with his gun. "Hands up!" he ordered. "Looks like we just got lucky, Sam."

_"Who is the Doctor?" the voice demanded. Her lip throbbed and bled—she could taste iron in her mouth and two of her teeth were loose. "How did you jump across universes?" She'd explained everything all ready—how she'd come to this universe, why she'd come to this universe, and most importantly why she couldn't go back, but the questions kept coming. "What are you?" She spat at her captor's feet. The blow, when it came, took the breath from her lungs. She was pretty sure she had at least one cracked rib. Tears dripped down her cheeks. She swore she wouldn't let them see—but she couldn't help it. Her body was a cage of pain and death was her only freedom._

His hands were rough and dirty and the sight of them on the arm of her jacket made Rose's lips curl into a sneer. She was relaxed, almost limp as he pawed through her pockets. The important things—her dimension canon, her gun, were useless to him and his ilk. His hands lingered over her breasts and she stiffened.

'_My name is Rose Tyler.' She wrote it over and over again—on the walls, on the floor, on her skin. She scratched it into the concrete with a rusty nail she found in the corner of the cell. She repeated it like a mantra in her head and out loud. They could take everything from her—her job, her home, her family, even her life—but they couldn't take her name. Not while she remembered it. _

He whistled when he pulled out her purse. It was heavy with coin—a benefit of being used to living with practically nothing. She didn't need much in the way of possessions; her lifestyle was transitory. The only thing that mattered was getting back to the Doctor, and if she happened to stop some scumbags on the way, well, that was a bonus. She had no house or family to sink money into. He held the bag up like a prize and she saw the other thug—Sam—loosen his grip on Kaylee.

_She vowed in the darkness of her cell that she would escape and when she did no one would hurt her like that, not ever. She would not do what her so-called friends had; she would not stand idly by and let people hurt those around her because questioning them would threaten her lifestyle. When the time came she would act._

_ Chopin was playing in her head._

Rose moved. She'd scoffed at the way movies portrayed violence—slow motion and incongruent music—but the description was strangely appropriate. Her senses were heightened, her mind raced, her blood thundered, and the noise of the street was drowned out by classical piano tinkling through her skull. The thug in front of her had a knife through his belt. She drew it, spun, and threw it in one swift motion. Sam yelped as it sunk into his shoulder and the knife fell away from Kaylee's neck. Rose elbowed the thug, who was now behind her, in the ribs as he fumbled for his gun. Of course he didn't expect her to fight back; they never did. He doubled over as she spun back to face him and kneed him in the groin. His gun, finally out of the holster, fell to the ground. Rose picked it up. The cracking sound the butt made as it connected with his skull was particularly satisfying.

An arm wrapped around her neck. "Gorram whore," a voice—Sam's—growled in her ear. "Gonna slit your throat for that."

His mistake was trying to use his injured arm. Rose brought her hand up and back, slamming it into the wet, sticky evidence of her good aim. He roared and his grip around her weakened enough so she could slip away. She didn't waste her time with words. Sam charged at her and she danced aside. He charged again and she slipped past the knife and grabbed his injured arm. He grunted and she allowed a smirk to slip across her lips, but then white-hot pain lanced through her side. Rose clamped one hand down. It came up red. She twisted and _pulled_ and Sam ended up on the ground. One of his knives skittered away and Kaylee picked it up. Rose knelt on his injured arm, making sure her knee ended up on his wounded shoulder, and pulled the knife from his grip. She held it to his throat.

"Now," she said quietly. "You and your friend are going to leave us alone. You're going to go back to whatever scumhole you crawled out of and you're going to stay there. Understand?" Sam nodded, his eyes wide. "Good," Rose told him. Then she stood and slid his knife into her belt. "Coming Kaylee?"

* * *

Simon Tam was not happy. He'd been stuck watching the ship the last _three times_ they'd been planetside, usually at Mal's insistence. Part of him suggested that the Captain finally trusted him, and that he should be proud that he was more than just a troublesome passenger now, but a larger part of him pointed out that Mal only had him stay behind because if he was on _Serenity_ it was likely that River was too, especially if Kaylee was otherwise occupied (which she was, shadowing Rose and Simon wasn't even going to think about that). So he was left alone, except for River, who had vanished somewhere in the bowels of the ship.

He pulled out the book he'd been reading when _Serenity_ was in port. At this rate he'd have it finished within the month. Simon couldn't say that he minded the quiet. After Jubal, he'd take any break they could get. Mal and Jayne and Zoe, even Kaylee, they squeeled at adventure. He preferred when things went smoothly, which was rare on this ship.

And since it was quiet, and he had time to appreciate it, something _had_ to go wrong. It began when River materialized next to his elbow.

"They're coming," she informed him and he almost dropped his book.

"River!" Simon exclaimed. "Don't _do_ that!"

She frowned at him. "Do what?"

He shook his head. "Never mind. Who's coming?"

River's eyes went distant, and for a moment she was looking _through_ him, not at him. "Kaylee and the wolf. Bring your doctor stuff, you're going to need it."

Simon felt like someone had just dumped a bucket of ice water over him. "Is Kaylee hurt?" he asked urgently.

River shook her head. "Not bad, just a little cut. The wolf will need you, though. There are monsters in her head and they won't stop screaming."

* * *

Rose was vaguely annoyed. The two _shānyáng tā mā de jìnǚ āng zāng de érzi(_1) had cut through her jacket. She _loved_ that jacket. It was TARDIS blue, for one, and it was the last thing that Tony had ever given her. _Don't think about Tony don't think about him oh god blood, his blood on her hands_. She was aware, on the edges of her consciousness, that Kaylee was looking at her like she had grown a second head. She was used to that sort of stare—wonder wrapped in a healthy dose of fear. Pity. She'd hoped that she could be friends with the cheerful mechanic. Rose was sadly lacking in friends. When she traveled with the Doctor there'd been no shortage of people (aliens or otherwise) she connected with, but now that she was back in her original universe she was more alone than ever. Ironic, that.

Rose was also aware that she was rambling in her mind, possibly going into shock. She had just been cut, after all, and though it didn't feel especially deep it was quite long and bleeding something fierce. Her shirt was beyond help but she might yet salvage the jacket. She kept one arm clamped against her side as she and Kaylee made their way back to _Serenity_.

_She kept seeing Tony's face. Every time she looked at her hands_ (_blood blood blood) she kept seeing him fall. _She_ did this. She killed her brother. She held him when he was a baby, rocked him to sleep and watched him grow up. She drove him to school and came to show-and-tell and career day. She lent him keys to her car so he could impress girls and supported him (against her mum) when he wanted to apply to work at Torchwood. She was there when he graduated from university and when he got married she was the best (wo)man. They were closer than almost anyone—and she killed him. It was her fault, all her fault, and she kept seeing him fall, kept seeing him die, kept seeing the blood on her hands._

The first thing Rose noticed, when she could tear her eyes away from the lines of red that were drying on her fingers, was noise. Someone was talking to her. For a moment she couldn't place the voice, but then it came to her. Simon Tam. _Serenity_. Persephone. And the memory of the knife against Kaylee's throat was enough to rip her from the loop of horror that was playing in her mind. _Chopin and blood. Knives and pain Red on white walls_. She looked up. Simon was standing in front of her, his hands on the arm that was pressed tight against her side.

"I need to see the wound, Rose," he said gently. He was speaking slowly, calmly, like he was trying not to startle a wild animal. "I need to remove your jacket."

Of course he did, she knew that. Silently she shrugged out of the jacket, wincing as a pain shot through her side. Her hands moved to the buttons on her shirt. Simon's cheeks were pink, she noted as she stripped the bloody mess off and laid it on the exam table by her jacket. It was sweet of him to be embarrassed, but she wasn't. Her body was just that—a body. More people than she could count had seen her naked, what was one more?

His eyes widened and his hand moved to her stomach, almost involuntarily. The scars. Her body was covered with them but they were most concentrated on her torso. She could remember the feel of every cut, every slice, and every experimental procedure designed to discover her secret to supposedly eternal life. She closed her eyes against the rush of images but she couldn't block them out—they were, after all, in her own head.

* * *

Malcolm Reynolds was many things: a veteran, smuggler, a thief, a captain, and occasionally a murderer if he needed to be (if someone threatened his ship, or his crew, or his own life). He was also (occasionally) a liar, a hardass, and very rarely—a hero. At the moment he was disquieted. He'd never been a fan of taking passengers; they were noisy and nosy and often not worth the trouble they brought. Simon and River Tam were a prime example of why he'd sworn off carrying passengers, as they were all three.

They were also family. They'd saved Mal's life several times and the lives of other crew members. He still didn't exactly _like_ the young doctor—man was too pretty, in his eyes, and interested in little Kaylee. Not that Kaylee wasn't a grown woman who could look after herself when it came to men-folk—but Mal looked on her with a mix of paternal and fraternal concern. She was like his little sister, and he'd be damned if he let some slick city boy break her heart.

But back to the topic that was troubling him before the always convenient distraction of Simon Tam surfaced—Rose Tyler, but more specifically, her friendship with Serenity's least stable passenger—River Tam. The girl wasn't all there, that was for sure. The few times they'd been forced to carry passengers before (out of sheer desperation for their coin) she'd remained hidden, content to watch. In fact, she had barely noticed the new people. She noticed Rose. After Mal came down the first morning to find River sitting contentedly next to the young woman he had seldom seen her anywhere else. Where Rose was, River was. When he asked her why, the strange girl replied that Rose was 'quiet,' whatever that meant. Quiet, Mal thought, was obviously relative. She wasn't loud by any stretch of the imagination, but she was pleasant and seemed especially close to Kaylee.

Mal really wasn't surprised. Serenity's mechanic was bright and bubbly and could charm a stone, if her effect on Simon Tam was any indication. He could use that charm right about now. Sure, Rose Tyler could be everything she said she was—but they'd all ready had one bounty-hunter on Serenity. Jubal Early was the first to find River, but he wouldn't be the last, not if the Alliance continued to offer a reward for River's capture. He'd been fooled once before by a pretty face and a sad story, and despite what Inara might say, Malcolm Reynolds tried not to make the same mistake twice.

He got the call when he and Zoe were on their way to a tavern. Zoe wasn't fond of them, but Mal squeeled at to blow off a little steam after a job well done. This one had been smooth, almost too smooth for his liking. A job wasn't done until something went wrong, Ma Reynolds used to say, and in his experience she was right more often than not. He was almost expecting the comms to ring, and when it did he wasn't surprised to find Kaylee on the other line.

"Mal," the girl said, and she sounded distressed. "You gotta come back. It's Rose."

Of course it was. He _knew_ passengers were trouble. If that _yuán àihào de nǚhái(2)_ brought trouble down on them he'd dump her in the nearest gutter and high-tail it. "What's she done, little Kaylee?"

"Nothin' Mal!" Kaylee's response was surprisingly vehement. "But she's hurt."

He frowned. "How's that any concern of mine?"

Kaylee sighed. "She saved my life, Cap'n, an' Simon said I should call."

Zoe was watching him, one eyebrow cocked in question. Mal groaned. "Be back in a few, an' you tell that doctor it better be worth it!"

"Back to the ship, sir?" Zoe asked.

"Back to the ship," he agreed grudgingly. Could this _fen chou(3) _day get any better?

* * *

Mal should have learned long ago not to ask that question even in the silence of his own mind, but he was stubborn so he did it anyway. He and Zoe arrived to a tearful Kaylee and a quiet ship.

"What's going on?" Mal asked as he strode into the cargo hold. Kaylee was perched on one of the boxes, waiting.

"It was my fault," she explained as they walked toward the surgery. "I closed my eyes for a _second_ and then there were these men, and they had knives." She swallowed and stroked the small bandage on her neck absently. Mal could see an ugly purple bruise forming—in the shape of a hand—and rage bubbled up within him.

"Where are they?" he demanded. _No one_ hurt a member of his crew and got away with it.

Kaylee shook her head. "Rose took care of them. She followed me into the alley—fought them off." Kaylee worried her bottom lip with her teeth. "You should've seen her, Cap'n. She fought like a wild thing."

* * *

Simon was washing his hands in the sink when they reached the surgery. Rose was perched on the examining bed with a thick white bandage wrapped around her waist. Mal averted his eyes but she seemed not to notice their presence. Instead she was focused on her jacket, which had a large rip in the right side.

"Good, you're back," Simon noted as he dried his hands. "Can I talk to you outside, Mal?"

Mal frowned as he moved just outside the surgery door. "This better be worth it, Doc."

Simon's face was set as he glanced back at his patient. "Did you notice the scars, Captain?"

Mal cocked his head to the side. "Of course I did, boy. What of it?" He noticed, all right. He'd never seen Rose in less than a long-sleeved shirt, despite the heat of the world they'd picked her up on, so after a brief moment of shock and slight embarrassment he noticed the thin lines that wound around her body and the blocky number that sat just above her elbow.

"I've seen scarring like that before," Simon went on.

"Have you now?" Mal crossed his arms. He didn't like where this was headed.

"Yes." Simon's voice was harder than usual. It lost a bit of its cultured Core accent and slipped into something sharper. "On cadavers. The major scar patterns are consistent with autopsy procedures, and some of the secondary patterns match examples of torture I read about in medical school."

"So someone cut her up." Zoe's voice was flat and angry. She didn't trust Rose either, Mal could tell, but that didn't mean she wished the girl harm. He certainly didn't. He'd been tortured and his hands curled into fists as he remembered what Niska had done, both to him and to Wash.

"Do you think she's like River?" Mal cut straight to the point.

Simon shrugged. "She seems more—balanced—than River. Whoever did this, though…"

"They're gone." Mal almost jumped as River materialized at Simon's elbow. The good doctor did jump. Zoe just regarded River with her usual stare. "They only see the girl," River continued, her eyes on Rose. "They took away her claws and thought she wouldn't fight." She made a sound of disgust deep in her throat. "Stupid. Wolves are never helpless, and when you put them in a corner they have that much left to lose." She flinched then, and covered her hands with her ears and whimpered.

"River?" Simon knelt in front of her. "River, what's wrong?"

"She's screaming!" River yelled. "Can't you hear, can none of you hear her? She's screaming and she won't stop!"

* * *

1 Filthy sons of a goat-fucking whore

2 Ape loving girl

3 Manure stinking


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: Nothing you recognize belongs to me! Some quotes taken from 'Parting of the Ways' for Doctor Who and _Serenity_ for Firefly. This chapter is actually pretty tame. If I gave my chapters titles in this fic this one would be 'things that happen around the dinner table that are not in fact dinner.' Enjoy!

* * *

Life on _Serenity_ settled into a pattern: they would land on a planet and the crew would head out to do a job and Rose would head out to explore and search for her mysterious 'friend.' They didn't comment when she returned to the ship alone each time, although Kaylee frequently gave out hugs. As the days became weeks became a month she brought back little things from each marketplace she visited. They were small, trinkets or sometimes spices. On a rare trip to Ariel she picked up a bit of rich blue cloth to patch the tear in her jacket. She and Kaylee found a handful of pretty stones on Constance and brought them back for River, who was delighted. When they were traveling she spent most of the night cycle awake, occasionally keeping Wash company in the cabin or reading in the kitchen or common rooms.

_Serenity_ had been grounded on Highgate for three days while Mal and Zoe negotiated a job with Nicolo Sharpeye. Inara had time to take a few clients, a rarity when Mal was in a traveling mood. It had been—stimulating, but she found that afterwards sleep would not come. It didn't help that she and Mal had fought on her return. She didn't know_ why_ but he had the ability to make her completely and absolutely _furious_. Well, she did know why—but she didn't want to admit it. Companions didn't fall in love, and if they did it wasn't with scruffy, smuggling ship captains with more 'honor' than brains.

She was still fuming when she tried to sleep and after hours of lying awake and staring at the ceiling Inara finally gave in. She rose, selected a few of her dresses that needed mending, found her sewing kit, and padded out of her shuttle. She could wait until they made port again and take the garments to a seamstress, of course she could—but she found that she liked sewing. All companions knew how, of course. Like playing a musical instrument it was considered a sign of sophistication and class, but beyond that Inara found sewing soothing. It occupied her hands while it left her mind free to wander. And—she could fix the dresses. She could patch them up and smooth them out and no one would have ever been able to tell they'd been torn. It was nice, sometimes, to deal with problems that could be solved and not left to fester in silence and confusion and hurt.

Inara paused. Light shone through the thick metal doorway that separated the kitchen from _Serenity's_ passages, and if she wasn't mistaken, someone was singing. Was Kaylee awake so late? Perhaps she was having nightmares. After she'd been attacked on Persephone she'd confessed to them several nights running. Inara drew nearer.

Rose was sitting at the kitchen table, her blue jacket spread out over the smooth wood. She had a needle in one hand and the other was supporting part of the garment. It had been ripped, Inara remembered, when she went to Kaylee's aid. The image was strange, but it was the song that gave her pause. Companions studied music, classical and contemporary, as part of their training. Whatever Rose was singing, Inara had never heard it before—and that was saying something. It was sweet and plaintive and sounded like a hymn, but not the sort of hymn one would hear from a Shepherd.

"Are you going to stand there all night?" Rose asked, as the echoes of the chorus faded.

Inara started. She hadn't realized the other woman knew she was there. "Do you mind if I join you?" she asked, ever polite.

Rose motioned for her to enter. She spread her first dress out on the table and carefully compared the color of the dress to her threads. Attention to detail was key in sewing. For a moment they worked in silence. As she carefully made neat, identical stitches Inara could feel the tension between her shoulders easing.

"I made tea," Rose said into the companionable silence. "Would you like some?"

"Oh," Inara replied with a smile. "Yes, please." Rose poured her a mug and Inara took a tentative sip. It was a darker blend than the pale green tea she usually served her clients and it lacked the fruity overtones characteristic of most currently popular teas. It was thicker, somehow, more earthy, but not bad. "Thank you," She said, "for the tea, of course, and for saving Kaylee. I don't believe I've had a chance to tell you yet." She paused, hesitant. "Are you in pain?"

Rose shrugged. "As pain goes, it isn't bad." She sipped her tea. "And you don't need to thank me. Kaylee is a good person; she's sweet and she's kind and the universe could use a few more like her."

"You two do seem to get along well," Inara noted

A smile curved Rose's lips. "She reminds me of myself when I was very young." The smile fell just a tad as Rose set her mug gently on the smooth wood of the table. "Miss Serra," she began. "You have questions. Please, just ask them. I may choose not to answer, but anything I tell you will be the truth."

Inara considered her for a moment, before also setting her mug on the table. "Are you a threat?" she said at last. "Everyone on _Serenity_, Mal, Shepherd Book, Kaylee, Simon, River, Zoe, Wash—even Jayne, they're my family. Will you bring harm to them?" Inara expected a swift denial, perhaps anger or indignation at her suggestion. She did not expect Rose to smile.

"You and your Captain are well paired," the other woman commented.

For a moment Inara was speechless, but her Companion training allowed her to cover her confusion with a sip from her mug. "I'm sorry," she said gently, "but Mal and I are not a couple." Rose's eyebrow shot toward her hairline but Inara refused to rise to her bait. Instead she took another drink of the strange, earthy tea.

"Oh," Rose said finally. "There's together, and then there's _together_. You and Captain Reynolds might not be official, but you're a pair." She ran her finger along the top of her own mug, and continued before Inara could interrupt. "My mum used to tell me 'never fall in love with a sailor or a man who's got principals, Rose.' 'Course I never listened—she had terrible taste in men—but I reckon she was right. A sailor's first love is always his ship, and a man who's got principals will put his honor first." She frowned. "Honor, that's a bit archaic. Integrity, maybe? No," Rose decided. "I like honor. Either way they're never just yours. They give themselves to something bigger, and when you've got both in one man it's—difficult, loving them." She wrapped her hands around her mug and let the heat seep through the ceramic and warm her. "But then, I think you know what I'm talking about." Inara tried to marshal an argument against what Rose had said, but her typical protestations deserted her. Rose smiled, drank the last of her tea, and tied off her thread. She held up the jacket and examined it critically. "There. Good as new." She gathered up her supplies and left her mug on the sideboard. "Goodnight," She called back to Inara as she left the kitchen in favor of her own sleeping quarters.

Inara watched her go until she was lost in the darkness of _Serenity's_ night cycle. That encounter had been—less than satisfying. She came to ease her disquiet, but found it had been magnified. Rose saw too much for her liking. She didn't have Companion training, although she moved with a reserved sort of grace that spoke of a strong body awareness and she was too observant to be completely without training. Inara turned her attention back to her dresses. The only thing that could make this night worse would be for Mal to turn up and start their argument over.

* * *

Mal gave the barrel of his second best gun one last polish and laid it on the table with the others. They would be planetside tomorrow and he made it a point to make sure all of his weapons were cleaned and oiled before use. Letting weapons fall into disrepair was a good way to get yourself killed, and maybe it was left over from his days as a soldier, but he found that he judged a man by how he cared for his guns. Zoe had her own spread out at the other end of the table. Rose and Wash were washing and drying the dishes, respectively. Jayne had cleared a space on the table for a sheet of paper; he was laboriously writing a letter to his mother. Most of the money he earned from jobs on _Serenity_ went to support his mother and his siblings. It would have been easy to hate Jayne after what he did with River, after he tried to sell her and Simon out to the Alliance, but Mal knew what that money would have meant to the man's family. There were no clear, cut and dry situations in the black.

River sat across from Jayne. She was playing with a handful of brightly colored stones, the same ones that Rose and Kaylee had given her. At first she liked them because they were pretty, but now she was ordering them carefully in pairs and groups. Her brows were pulled together in concentration and she muttered to herself as she rearranged them.

A bright laugh drifted in from the hall as Kaylee followed Simon back into the kitchen. He stood behind River and put his hands on her shoulders. "What are you doing, _Mei me_i?"

She didn't take her eyes off of her stones. "There's always order in a wolf pack. I'm trying to see where everyone fits."

"Wolves again?" Kaylee asked as she slid into the seat next to River. "I've never even seen a wolf, not even a picture."

River rolled her eyes. "You so have," she informed the other girl, and then returned her attention to the stones.

Mal enjoyed the quiet times. In his experience excitement meant trouble meant complications, and he liked simple, simple and easy and get in, get the goods, get paid. There were too many opportunities for things to go wrong when jobs got complicated.

Wash was drying the last of the dishes when River swept her stones into a pile, evidently done fiddling with them. She turned to Rose, who was wiping her hands on a towel. "Tell me a story about the man in your head," she asked.

Mal's eyebrows shot up. Simon looked disturbed—even Kaylee seemed a bit unnerved, but Rose calmly finished drying her hands. "It's rude to go poking around in someone's head without permission," she chided gently.

River pouted. "Can't help it. Besides, he's so _loud_."

Rose left the towel on hanging from its peg and sat down on River's other side. "I know, _qīn'ài de rén(_1)." She cocked her head to the side. "What kind of story are you looking for?"

"A true one," River answered almost immediately.

A wide smile curved Rose's lips. "Oh River, all stories are true." She leaned back in her chair and began to speak.

"Once upon a time there was a boy who lived in a beautiful city on a beautiful planet. The grass was red and the sky was orange and the trees were silver, and the wind made a sound like music when it blew down the slopes of the snow-capped mountains through the sparkling forests. Every night he would look up at the stars shining through the crystal dome that protected the city and he would dream of seeing those stars up close, of seeing other planets—but all of his elders told him that no one left the beautiful world voluntarily. Everything he could ever need or ever want was right in front of him, but he didn't believe that. He didn't believe that nothing in the universe could compare to his home, even though it was very beautiful." She glanced at River. "What do you think he did?"

River grinned. "I think he ran away."

Rose laughed. "You'd be right. He stole a ship, or maybe she stole him, and he ran as far and fast as he could, away from rules and boundaries and stuffy old men and women telling him how to think and feel and act. He saw every star in that sky, and he never stopped running. He visited strange planets and met strange people, and by people I mean aliens, and he learned all about the universe—but he was lonely. It was a wonderful life, full of excitement, but when you're traveling the stars what you need more than a ship is a friend—so he found some. They came and they chased back the loneliness for a while, but they never stayed. Eventually they grew up or they moved on, or they discovered that they could be special on their own, and some of them died. But eventually," she pushed on. "Eventually he found someone who wanted to stay with him forever because she loved the stars almost as much as she loved him."

"Why did she leave?" River asked. "If she wanted to stay, why didn't she?"

"She fell," Rose replied gently. "They were in the thick of things, saving the universe from people who were arrogant and ignorant and cruel, who played with technology they couldn't hope to understand and refused to listen when he tried to warn them. There was a battle, and while he was saving everyone else on the planet—he lost her."

"Is that the end?" River demanded after a long moment of silence.

"Not all stories have happy endings," Kaylee told her.

"Not all stories have endings," Rose corrected. "They have places where the telling stops and starts."

"But she can't just give up!" River frowned, clearly displeased. "She can't let them win!"

"It's just a story, River," Simon pointed out and laid a calming hand on her arm.

"It's not!" she snapped back.

"Did I ever say she was?" Rose asked, eyebrow raised. "Of course she doesn't!"

"Then does she make it back? Does she find him again?" River's eyes were wide and expectant.

Rose shrugged. "I don't know. Perhaps she does, perhaps she doesn't, but even if she never sees him again, even if she never finds out whether or not he loves her as much as she loves him, she won't stop trying."

River settled back in her chair and stroked one of her stones. It was clear, with flecks of gold that caught the light. "Good," she said firmly. "Wolves shouldn't be alone."

* * *

Wash was used to being the last one awake on _Serenity_. It came with the job, really. As a pilot he spent most of his time in the cockpit, monitoring their path and communications channels. He liked it, really. He could see the stars sparkling in the black. He missed the stars when he was planetside, not that he had anything _against_ planets, not exactly, but there's nothing like the black to make a man feel free. He realized that he was babbling and there was no one around to hear him, not that anyone could anyway, as he was babbling in his head.

He was nervous. They were touching down tomorrow to finish a job and he was always nervous when Mal and Zoe and Jayne went out. They were big boys and girls, they could take care of themselves, and his wife was a warrior. He didn't call her an Amazon for nothing, after all. Still—he worried, especially now that he _knew_ what could be waiting for them. Niska's attentions left him with vicious scars and a host of nightmares. What if something went south? What if they were outgunned and outnumbered? What if she was hurt? Wash took a deep breath and forced himself to stop. The best way for him to help Zoe and Mal was to stay with the ship. He'd been jealous of them, of their camaraderie and the way she obeyed Mal to a fault. He was a damn fine pilot, and _that_ was where he belonged—with _Serenity_, waiting to swoop in and rescue them if need be.

A knock on the doorframe startled him. He glanced up. Rose was standing the in doorway. "Mind if I come in?" she asked with a tight-lipped smile.

Wash nodded. He should have known, really. She was the only one who bothered to knock. Zoe knew she didn't need to, Mal figured the whole gorram ship was his so why bother, and no one else seemed to think of it. He found he liked the courtesy. She stepped inside the cockpit and slouched down into the copilot's chair. Wash didn't mind her company in the quiet hours of the night cycle. He liked to talk and he found her easy to talk to. She didn't always respond but she did listen, and when she answered him he found she was surprisingly funny. Rose came almost every cycle; she'd stop by, spend a few hours watching the stars and listening to him regale her with stories of his escapades (most of which he fabricated on the spot), and then bid him a good night and withdraw as silently as she came.

He thought that maybe she missed the stars. He could sympathize. It wasn't good to keep a starcreature planetbound. It did something to them, broke something inside. She had been walking in the dust for too long, he thought. There was something sad about her, something a little bit lost.

Wash cleared his throat. Rose glanced at him, a question plane on her face. "Have I introduced you to everyone yet?" he asked, and motioned to the scattering of plastic dinosaurs on the console.

A real, tongue-touched grin lit up her face and suddenly she was beautiful. "No," Rose answered. "I don't think you have."

"I should rectify that," he decided. "Do you have time? It's a long and complicated list."

She leaned forward, elbows on her knees. "I've got time. Who's first?"

* * *

Rose dropped her bag on the compact bunk of her sleeping quarters and rested her head against the smooth, cool wall of the bulkhead. She was tired. She was dirty. She'd been traveling with _Serenity_ for three months and she hadn't seen a single sign of a Time Agent. Despair bubbled up inside her, threatened to choke her with its bitter tang. She knew this trip was going to be a bust the minute she found out where they were going. Aberdeen was the 13th planet orbiting the star Kalidasa and the destination of whatever shady job Mal had managed to procure.

Even now it made her want to laugh, and she wondered for a moment about Sarah Jane. How was she doing? Had she seen the Doctor again? Did she know about Canary Wharf? When (_if_ a treacherous part of her brain whispered) she got back to her proper time she would make the Doctor stop by for a visit. _If he still wants you_, that treacherous whisper continued, and she was too tired to squash it. _If he hasn't found someone else. If you're not just someone who used to travel with him. Who knows, maybe this time you'll get to be the ex_.

* * *

A shower made Rose feel much better. It always did, being clean. She could collect all of her anger and fear and frustration and pain and let the water wash it all away. When she was dry and presentable she went to one of the common rooms near the surgery. Most of the crew of _Serenity_ preferred to congregate around the table in the kitchen and she could use a bit of hush at the moment. She settled down onto the surprisingly comfortable couch and closed her eyes. Out of habit more than anything Rose stretched out her mind for the sound of the TARDIS. Ever since Satellite Five she'd been able to hear the ship singing in her head. At first she simply thought that the temperamental time ship was growing more fond of her, but after her time in Torchwood's dungeon she knew the truth. She was different now, not quite human, and the TARDIS knew. Her mind had changed and the ship called out to her, wrapped Rose in her song and let her know that she was not alone. It was confirmation that she was in the right universe and that she _would_ find the Doctor again.

A soft scuffing alerted her to River's presence. Rose could feel the girl on the edges of her consciousness. She was bright, so bright, and completely open. Rose's stomach clenched in revulsion. Human beings weren't supposed to be telepathic. The Doctor had explained once, back when he still wore leather. Every species had the potential for telepathy but most never developed it; only a handful of races ever had a need for it. There were individuals who were exceptions, but they were rare and frequently rather weak. River was _enormously_ powerful—and her gifts were artificial. Someone had cut into her brain with all the precision of a chainsaw until they managed to damage the right parts in order to trigger telepathy. It was trauma induced and it fractured her. If the Doctor had been there, he would have tracked down whoever had perpetrated this monstrosity and personally shut them down.

Rose opened her eyes. River was sitting next to her. She was playing with the stones again, rearranging them. "Still having trouble with your pack?" Rose asked.

River shrugged. "Dynamics are fluid." One stone was off to the side. Rose picked it up. It was smooth like it had come from a river, and the gold flecks lodged in the clear quartz crystal sparkled in the light. "Pyrite," River noted. "Fool's gold. It's deceptive."

"Why isn't it with the others?" Rose wanted to know.

River looked at her like she'd dribbled on her shirt. "A pack can only have one Alpha pair, Wolf."

Rose jumped as Simon and Mal strode into the room. They were arguing, as usual. "Ladies," Mal said tersely as he tried to duck through the door to the cargo bay.

"We should hit more Core planets!" Simon insisted. "The last job that got us any real money was on Ariel. We could try another hospital."

"They'll be wise to us now, Doc," Mal snapped back.

River ignored the squabble happening next to them; her attention was fixed on Rose. "I can hear her," she said, eyes wide with wonder. She reached out a hand and brushed her fingers over Rose's temple. "She sings to the universe inside her head, and I can _hear_."

Rose caught her wrist and pulled her hand away gently. "That isn't a good idea, River. There are things in my head that you don't need to see."

River's eyes drifted shut and her face set in lines of extreme concentration. She began to hum, tentatively at first and then with greater confidence. The argument besides them slowed and then stopped.

Mal turned to look at the women on the sofa. "What's your sister doing now?" he demanded.

Simon frowned. "I don't know."

"River," Rose began, her face pale. "River, you need to stop."

River ignored her. The humming grew louder, stronger, more insistent. The melody sent chills up Mal's spine. It was haunting, lovely, really, but strange. _Alien_, his mind supplied, but he shied away from the word. Rose had told a fairy tale about aliens, but that's all it was—a story. The song was like something he'd heard in a dream, once, a memory that hovered just outside of conscious thought. River began to sway gently in time to the song.

Rose flinched. She was shaking, Mal realized. A sheen of sweat covered her skin, made her almost look to glow in _Serenity's_ artificial light. "_River. Stop it, please!_" Her voice was strange, almost as if another voice was layered over it. Her accent was gone and she sounded anguished.

River continued to ignore her. Something in the song shifted. It had been welcoming, joyful even. It became something darker, almost menacing. Fear gripped him, made the palms of Mal's hands sweaty and his heart pound. He fought the feeling. There was nothing to be afraid of here. He was on his ship with his crew. _There was nothing that could hurt him_.

"River!" Simon yelled. He grabbed her shoulders but she didn't seem to hear. She was lost in the music.

Rose screamed.

River's eyes flew open and the humming ceased. Simon pulled her gently towards him and off of the couch, but as soon as she could stand she sprang away from him. Her face was wild as she stared around the room, looking for all the world like a caged animal. "Get out, get out!" she yelled. "Thoughts like lock-picks in your head; crack you open little watch and see what makes you tick!" An edge of hysteria crept into her voice. "They put you in a cage with a muzzle over your mouth, make you howl when they want you to. You blow down those houses of sticks and straw and rebuild in brick!" She laughed. It was terrifying. "They woke up the big bad wolf and are surprised when she devours them!" She stared at the wall but her eyes were glazed and far, far away. "I can see everything, but why does it hurt?" she asked plaintively. She covered her ears and her face contorted in pain. "They're screaming! Why won't they stop screaming? Get out, get out of my head!"

Simon grabbed her by the shoulders. "River, it's me, it's Simon," he said soothingly. "I need you to calm down, please."

She blinked at him. "Simon?" she asked in a small voice. Her eyes were wide in her pale face, making her look even younger than she was. "I think I did a bad thing."

* * *

_They tied her wrists behind her back and bound her ankles to the chair. The unyielding metal pressed into her skin and she knew there would be bruises later. The telepath they'd hired to break into her head looked like a velociraptor with feathers. There was an interesting thought—would dinosaurs have been the dominant life form if mammals hadn't come around? She was rambling and she knew it, even in her head, but panic was making it hard to focus. She tried to call up her barriers, the ones the Doctor made for her. She tried to fight. The feathered velociraptor stretched out a surprisingly dexterous claw._

_ It felt like dying. It felt like fire in her skull, like everything that was _Rose_ was being stripped down, ripped out. She screamed and screamed and screamed (in her head, out loud, she couldn't tell anymore). _

_ And then, abruptly, it stopped. Golden warmth suffused her, soothed the burning ache. The universe expanded around her, endlessly complex, stunningly vast. _

I can see the whole of time and space, every atom of your existence—and I divide them.

_An entire Dalek fleet turned to dust. The telepath's screams fail to penetrate the golden fog that surrounds her._

All things, everything dies.

_She was more than Rose Tyler. She had chosen this because she would not be parted from him and now—now she could not be. Timelines ran around her, circled her, strangled her and she brushed them aside. She was the _Bad Wolf_ and Time bent to her will. She spoke with the voice of the universe and she said_ No.

* * *

Rose was curled into a ball on the floor. Her arms were wrapped around her head, protecting her neck and her knees were tucked under her chin. She looked like a child being beaten, frantically trying to make herself a smaller target. Mal knelt beside her. "What in the _qī bīngdòng dìyù(2)_ did your sister do, boy!" he demanded.

"River?" Simon asked.

She shook her head, eyes closed. Tears dripped down her cheeks. "I didn't mean to! I just wanted to hear the singing!"

Mal reached out a hand but Rose jerked before he could touch her. He pulled back, startled, as she slowly unfolded. She moved with a fluid grace that was not her own until she was standing, eyes still closed, the back of her legs flush against the couch.

"Rose?" Simon called gently. "Rose, can you hear me?"

For a long moment she was still, and then her eyes opened. Mal echoed Simon's quick intake of breath. Golden fire blazed where soft brown had been. She turned her head, regarded the three of them. "_Prophet_," she said, looking at River and then turning her attention to Simon and Mal. "_Healer, and hero. The rage—it burns. They all lie down. Make them get up. Make them_ _get_ up_!_" Her hands came up and she clutched her head as in pain or perhaps fear. "_Ring around the rosie, a pocket full of posies, ashes, ashes we all fall down! Oh god_!" she sobbed in that strange, choral voice. "_Oh god, make me a stone!_" Then her eyes rolled back in her head and she collapsed.

* * *

1. Dear one

2. seven frozen hells


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: Nothing you recognize belongs to me!

* * *

Simon dropped to his knees next to Rose, who remained unconscious. Mal stood, eyes wide and fixed on the girl. She looked small and young; all traces of whatever the hell had been speaking was gone. "What in holy _hell_ was that?" he demanded.

"I have no idea," Simon replied. His voice was even, but soft. "Her pulse is steady and her breathing is good. She seems fine, just—unconscious."

"It's my fault," River said, tears standing in her eyes. "I didn't mean to, Simon, I promise I didn't mean to, but there was the singing, and I just wanted to _hear_ but there are monsters in her head, monsters that look like people." She shuddered. Simon looked up at her and sighed.

"I know, _mei mei_," he murmured. "I know."

Kaylee skidded into the room, Zoe just behind her. Kaylee panted as she stared wildly around the room. Zoe was calmer, but her gun was out and her finger was a hairsbreadth away from the trigger. "Everything alright Sir?" the black woman asked.

"We heard the yellin,' Mal," Kaylee added. "What happened?" She finally saw Rose crumpled against the couch and gasped. "[oh my ships and stars!] Is she hurt, Simon?"

"As near as I can tell, no," the doctor replied. "But we need to get her to the infirmary. There are some tests I can run."

"You do that, Doc," Mal agreed, "but you lock that door behind you. I don't want her going anywhere."

In the end Jayne was pressed into carrying Rose, who remained unconscious. He grumbled, of course, just as he always did, but when Mal shouted Jayne did as he was told. Simon and Book, who confessed to some small knowledge of medicine, examined Rose, but to no avail. All of the tests, even the bloodwork, seemed to indicate that she was in perfect health, although there were some strange proteins Simon found himself unable to identify. Not drugs, he assured Mal, but—strange. Zoe led Kaylee out after she became distraught. Mal had half a mind to order River to go with them, but the girl was intrigued by the spectacle and she seemed determined to stay. Jayne was gone; he'd left after he realized that all of Rose's clothes would remain intact. No offense, he told Mal, but he could look at clothed women any time he wanted to, and there were some lovely ladies waiting for him in his bunk. Mal told him that was more information than he ever needed to hear.

River stood next to the exam table. She was careful to remain out of the way, but she held Rose's hand in her own. The girl would twitch sometimes, like she was having a nightmare, and occasionally she cried out, although she remained dead to the world. 'Doctor!' she would call, distress clear in her voice.

"She's done that several times," Book noted as he stood next to River.

River shrugged. "Your book talks about faith that can move mountains—what about love that can stop bullets, or douse stars, or crack open the universe and stitch it back together? When you're lost," she continued, "you cry out to your god. She has him."

"No offense to the good doctor," Mal commented dryly, "but that's an awful lot of faith to be putting in man she just met three months ago."

River rolled her eyes. "Not _a_ doctor. _The_ Doctor. The article is definite; the man is singular."

"Who is this 'Doctor?'" Simon asked as he cleaned his instruments in the sink. "Maybe I've heard of him."

"The Doctor is a legend," Book said slowly, his face troubled. "An old, old story, all the way from Earth-that-was. Thousands of cultures all around the planet had stories of a man who called himself 'the Doctor,' just 'the Doctor,' and they all had one feature in common: where he went, chaos followed, and often death." He frowned. "It's an obscure legend, and one I haven't heard mention of in a very long time."

River brushed a stray lock of hair back from Rose's face and squeezed her hand. "The story changes with the teller," she remarked, "as stories usually do. He's a hero and a trickster, a demon and a madman, a savior and a judge." Her eyes went distant, and her voice was soft. "He's like fire and ice and rage. He's the night and the storm in the heart of the sun. He's ancient and forever. He can feel the turn of the Earth and he burns at the heart of the universe. He's everywhere in her head."

"Well," Mal cut in, breaking the mood. "That's a lovely story. Is she stable, doc?"

Simon nodded. "Yes, she should be." He held a syringe up to the light and tapped it against his finger gently, making sure to remove all air bubbles. "It's a mild sedative," he explained. "It should keep her under for a few hours, two at the most."

"Good," Mal said. "We need to talk"

* * *

He gathered the crew in the kitchen, at the dinner table after Simon checked on Rose one last time and locked the doors behind him. Mal had half a mind to tell the man to tie her down to the exam table, but he had a sneaking suspicion that the good doctor would object to such treatment. He had no qualms about traveling with smugglers, but he was surprisingly ethical in how he treated his patients. Even Jayne, who had once sold Simon and River out to the Alliance was assured that he would receive the doctor's utmost attention. Mal approved of ethics, as long as they weren't terribly inconvenient, and Simon's devotion to his calling earned him a bit of respect (just a little though, there was no need for the boy to be getting a swelled head, after all).

"Miss Tyler," he began, when everyone was present and accounted for, "has been traveling with us for three months now, and I know that some of you have gotten close with her, but I need your honest assessment of her now." He stood behind his chair, hands on the smooth wooden back and leaned forward. "I have reason to believe she may be a threat to _Serenity_, and to us. Inara," he said and nodded at her. "Your—training—has always been useful in these matters. What do you make of her?"

To an observer Inara Serra appeared as she always did, polite and unruffled. Those who knew her, like the rest of the crew, could tell she was disturbed. "I do not make her to be a threat," she said eventually. "She is guarded and very observant and I believe she has had some sort of training, though not companion level." She paused. "There is something Rose appeared unwilling to discuss, but it was vague, and considering that we are not exactly completely honest in our chosen occupation," she included the whole of _Serenity_ in her remarks, "I find demanding total honesty from her to be just a tad hypocritical." She folded her hands in front of her. "In my experience everyone is running from something."

"Noted," Mal replied shortly.

"Well, I think y'all are puttin' the cart before the horse," Kaylee interjected heatedly. "She ain't done nothin' to harm us, Cap'n, an' I don't think she would, not after she saved my life like she did. She coulda just left me, or called the cops an' let them deal with it, but she didn't. She may have looked a bit off after she was done—but no more'n you look on a bad day, Mal."

"Thank you for that opinion, little Kaylee." Mal's voice was dry. "What about you, doctor? Anything to add?"

Simon leaned in. He looked, Mal thought, like he was acutely aware of the attention everyone was giving him, especially Kaylee. "Despite the scarring evident," he replied, "her injuries appear to have been inflicted by someone with a great deal of medical knowledge. She healed well, and she must have required stitches. The brand on her arm is reminiscent of the Nazi experiments that occurred on Earth-that-was and suggests that her captors wished to dehumanize her." He took a deep breath. "It is possible that she was involved in a program similar to the Academy."

"_Shàng yìyuàn hé shèngrén, méiyǒu yīgè ānquán de_?(1)" Wash muttered.

"She appears to have combat training, sir," Zoe added. "Military grade, I'd hazard. She's had weapons training, at least, knives and I'd wager guns as well, and probably hand-to-hand. She moves like she's had training, and she _notices_ things like a soldier would. If she isn't a soldier now, she has been."

"I agree," Mal said with a sharp nod.

"She has a great deal of knowledge about Earth-that-was," Book interjected, "but she's never given any sign that she's dangerous or malicious. We shouldn't rush judgment, Captain, when we're unsure of the circumstances."

"The safety of this ship and this crew is my responsibility, Shepherd," Mal told him. "And that takes precedence over one person of doubtful origin." He pinched the bridge of his nose. A headache was brewing just behind his eyes, a sensation that he usually associated with River's antics or Jayne's propensity to dally on a job to make a pretty lady. He didn't exactly trust the siblings Tam, but River had saved the rest of the crew with her plan when Jubal Early and she'd sensed the Reavers when they pulled that payroll job. He didn't think she'd withhold information that was terribly dangerous, seeing as how she lived on _Serenity_ as well (and she seemed to want to stay). He sighed and turned to face the girl. She was playing with her stones again. The gold-flecked one was grouped with two others this time: a plain, brown stone and a deep blue pebble with bands of some purple rock and clear quartz running through it.

"River," he began with some trepidation. "Is she dangerous?"

"Too vague," the girl replied almost before he'd finished speaking. "Too many variables. You must refine the question and define the parameters of 'dangerous.'" She glanced up. "Zoe is dangerous, Jayne is dangerous, Kaylee and Simon and the Shepherd are dangerous. You are dangerous. I am dangerous. What is one more danger on _Serenity_?"

"I'm not dangerous?" Wash asked almost plaintively.

River rolled her eyes. "You are the guide, of course you are. I thought that was obvious."

Mal frowned at her and shot a quelling glare in Wash's direction. "Is she a threat?" he tried again

River paused. "To us?" she asked. "Doubtful. To the Alliance? Probably." A vicious grin spread across her face. "To anyone who tries to keep her from her mate? Certainly."

"_She_ can speak for herself, you know." Rose's voice drifted from the hallway into the kitchen. Mal spun around, his hand automatically going for his gun (which was unfortunately not on him). Zoe had hers out and aimed and Jayne was a hairsbreadth behind her. Rose held up her hands, palm out, to demonstrate that she was unarmed.

"I told you to lock that door, boy," Mal growled.

"I did!" Simon protested. "I checked it twice!"

"Relax," Rose told them. "If I may?" Zoe nodded and Rose tossed a small metal cylinder to Mal, who caught it easily. "Your locks aren't that good, Captain."

"How on _Shàngdì de lǜsè dìqiú_(2) do you pick a pressure lock?" he demanded.

Something in her face went hard. "I've broken out of a top-secret, heavily fortified government research building. _Serenity_'s medbay isn't nearly as secure."

"So you _are_ a fugitive," Simon commented.

Rose shook her head. "Not exactly. It's—complicated."

Mal folded his arms over his chest. "I don't care how _Tā mā de_(3) complicated you think your situation is—give me one good reason why I shouldn't let Zoe shoot you and be done with it."

She studied him for a moment, head cocked to the side, and goosebumps crawled up his spine. She looked like River did on a bad day, like she was looking _through_ him at something only she could see. "You could," Rose said finally, "but you won't. It goes against everything you are. You're hard, Captain, but you're fair, and you're ex-military which doesn't have to mean anything, but it means something to you. You may not follow the Alliance's laws, and I don't blame you, but you've got your own rules. I've done nothing to endanger you or your crew."

Mal's glare did not lessen. "You'd better explain right quick, Miss Tyler, or so help me I will have you gagged and bound and locked in one of _Serenity_'s smuggling compartments to be turned over to the Alliance when we next make planetfall."

She went still in a way that Mal had never seen before. For the span of several seconds she was like stone. She didn't even seem to breathe—but then she spoke, very quietly. "That," she said and her voice was flat and deadly, "that would be a very bad idea. That, Captain Reynolds, would be the biggest mistake you ever made."

He remained impassive. She was giving him the willies but he'd be damned if he let her know it.

River stepped in front of Rose. "Stop it!" she ordered. "Both of you, all of you, stop it!" She looked imploringly at Mal. "It was me, it was my fault. I just wanted to hear the singing, but I couldn't stop. She wouldn't let me stop. The wolf is pacing her cage, looking for cracks. She wants to be free. I'm sorry," she said to Rose, who laid a comforting hand on her arm.

"I know, _mei mei_." Then she dropped her hand and without missing a beat pulled her shirt over her head and dropped it on the floor. Malcolm Reynolds might be a smuggler and occasionally a murderer (though he would always claim self-defense) he still remembered the manners Ma Reynolds had drilled into him (occasionally with a wooden spoon). He averted his eyes from the suddenly shirtless girl in front of him. Jayne felt no such compunction and he looked Rose up and down casually. Simon, for all of his cool professionalism when treating her wounds still blushed and looked away. "You can look," Rose said, her voice hard. "Go ahead, if you want to know what I'm running from."

Kaylee's eyes widened as she took in the tracery of scars that covered Rose's torso. Inara covered her mouth with one hand, her careful composure cracked and fell by the wayside.

Wash blanched and Zoe remained impassive. She had seen torture before, had helped her husband through the nightmares that followed his experience with Niska. Shepherd Book did not look surprised. Resignation and sorrow was writ in the lines around his mouth and eyes. "Some things," he said softly, "never change, despite how much we wish they would."

"You were at the academy," Simon said, "weren't you? In a different program than River?"

She shook her head. "No. This wasn't the Alliance." Her mouth twisted into a sardonic smile. "You can't pin this on them, despite their other sins." Rose traced the blocky number burned into her arm just above her elbow. "My captors gave me this the day they decided I wasn't human enough to be a person, the day they tried to take my name from me." For a long moment she remained silent, her eyes fixed on the wall, and Mal knew she was seeing ghosts.

"You're like her, though," Simon tried again.

For some reason that brought a small smile to Rose's lips. "Oh Simon, no one is like River—not even her classmates. What happened to me was a—a side effect. I had the chance to save the life of someone I love, but in doing so I was exposed to something that—altered me." She picked her shirt up from the floor and slipped it back on. Jayne opened his mouth to protest but closed it again after Mal shot him a quelling glare.

Rose looked around, a sort of sad amusement playing across her face. "How old," she said slowly, "do you think I am?"

"Twenty-five?" Wash offered.

Zoe studied her for a moment. "Twenty-seven."

"Twenty-three, maybe twenty-four," Kaylee suggested.

Mal snorted. "I know better than to guess at a lady's age. It never ends well."

That brought a proper smile to Rose's face, a flash of mischief, but it slid from her face like water through a sieve. "I'm one hundred and ninety-two years old." Incredulous silence greeted her declaration. "I don't age," she continued. "And I metabolize drugs differently from a generic human, so if there is a next time, Simon, I'd appreciate it if you didn't give me anything without my knowledge. Certain drugs that are harmless to you will hurt me." Her eyes flickered back to Mal for a moment. "Aspirin, for example, while not fatal is painful and debilitating, as my captors discovered." A humorless laugh bubbled up through her lips. "They were looking for the secret to eternal life, and isn't that a terrifying thought? But what did this to me is—difficult to obtain. I should have died, I would have died, if he hadn't—" She closed her mouth hard enough for her teeth to click together, like she'd said more than she should. "If the Alliance finds out what I can do," she continued after a moment, "they'll try to make me into a weapon." Her eyes blazed and her chin lifted as if she was daring Mal to find fault with her. "I _will not allow_ that."

"What about your 'captors,' whoever they are?" Mal demanded. "When can we expect them to call? Surely they're wanting you back."

"They're dead," Rose told him flatly. "I killed them. That's why you have to stay out of my head, _mei mei_," she directed to River. "There are things in there that no one needs to see, least of all you, who sees too much. And the last person who found the memory that you did—she died. Screaming."

"And on that cheery note," Mal broke in.

"I know that your first responsibility is to your crew," Rose cut him off. "To the crew and to _Serenity_, but no one in the Alliance knows what I am and I'd like to keep it that way. I don't like killing, and I've no desire to be a weapon. Just—let me collect my things and I can be gone when we make planetfall tomorrow. Let me leave in peace."

Mal frowned. "It's a weighty matter, and one I'll need to think on. I'll let you know in the morning."

* * *

As he had in the trenches, Mal found that sleep was hard to come by when a decision loomed before him. Rose was undoubtedly dangerous and his life would be simpler if she were to be gone, but Kaylee was right—she hadn't given any cause to throw her out. And the coin she'd given them went a long way toward keeping _Serenity_ in flight and his crew fed. Planetdwellers would never understand, but _Serenity_ was more than a ship. She was _home_, and he owed it to his crew (his family) to keep her flying as long as possible. He rolled over and punched his pillow, but he knew that it was futile. Until his mind stopped racing sleep would be a lost cause.

As was his custom on nightcycles when sleep eluded him, Mal found himself wandering the halls of his ship. It was quiet at night, without the echoing ring of boots on steel grating and the chatter of his crew. The only sounds that broke the silence of the black were the soft hum of the engines and other mechanical noises. Kaylee, he knew, could tell a problem by sound alone.

His first stop was the cockpit, but he found it empty. It was late, then, if Wash was in bed. The pilot often spent much of the early nightcycle monitoring the comms and plotting their course. Mal lingered for a moment, his eyes on the brightly colored plastic dinosaurs that Wash insisted on having atop the console.

The kitchen was next on his route. It was the hub of _Serenity_ when they weren't on a job. Quarters were small out of necessity, and the kitchen, with its sturdy wooden table and chairs, afforded the occupants a chance to socialize. A light indicated that someone else shared his insomnia, and he thought he knew who it was. When he saw the soft yellow light reflecting off blonde hair he knew he was right. Rose sat at the table, a battered leather wallet in her hands.

"Captain," she said without looking up. "Come to tell me to pack my bags?"

"I haven't decided," he replied shortly, and slid into one of the chairs across from her. For a long moment they were silent: he was absorbed in his thoughts and she seemed to be focused on the little wallet. "Whatcha got there?" he asked eventually.

"Pictures," she replied, and tilted it so he could see. The first was a man and a woman. The man was dressed in a suit that would have been fancy, even for the Core. He had reddish hair that was thinning in the front and a nervous smile that was aimed at the woman. She was shorter and blonde and the resemblance to Rose was clear. "My mum an' stepdad," she told him. "This was taken at their wedding." A soft smile stole across her face. "He made her so, so happy."

The next picture was Rose in a tailored leather jacket that had a stylistic letter 'T' emblazoned n the front. A dark-skinned young man with a short beard stood behind her and a blonde young man with spiked hair was next to him. They were also wearing leather jackets with the strange 'T' decoration. The man from the first photo, her stepfather, was there as well, watching from the side. "My friend Mickey," she explained. "And Jake. We were—coworkers." There were other pictures of the three of them, sometimes accompanied by Rose's parents, sometimes alone, and once it was just Rose and Mickey, standing on a rocky looking beach. She skipped over that photo without a word, and he read tension in the way her lips tightened and the shadows in her eyes deepened.

She stopped on a picture of her mum holding a little blonde-haired boy. He had brown eyes and a mischievous smile, and the resemblance between him and the woman in front of Mal was so strong that he was almost afraid to ask. It was a terrible, unnatural thing for a parent to bury a child, and if she really was 192 years old that little boy was long dead. "Yours?" he asked eventually.

To his great relief, Rose shook her head. "My little brother, Tony." There was a catch in her voice as she stared at the photograph. "He died getting me out."

"I'm sorry," Mal told her softly.

She shrugged and sniffed. "It was a long time ago." A muscle in her jaw twitched. "And they paid for it—they paid a hundred times over." She flipped past other pictures with the little boy and the man he grew into. At the end of the wallet there were two pictures. Rose studied one of them for a long, silent moment before she held it up in front of Mal. It was a picture of a man. He was tall and skinny and he wore a suit that was fancy for the rim, but shabby compared to her stepfather's. A red paper hat perched on his shaggy brown hair. He was sitting with his elbows on a table. His chin rested on his folded hands as he smiled widely at the camera.

"This is the Doctor," she said, and something in her voice changed.

He didn't look particularly imposing. He looked, Mal thought, like a young man in love. "River seems to think he's some sort of force of nature."

Rose laughed. "Oh, he is, Captain. He is. He's like—like a storm. It brings the rain that waters the crops and people and animals, but it also brings destruction. There are legends about him, stories that get passed down from generation to generation, but he's so much more than that. He's manic and clever and an impossible, arrogant git sometimes. He loves and hates himself in equal measure and he's rude and not ginger, well, not when I knew him." Her smile faded and a pensive note crept into her voice. "He tries _so hard_ to save everyone that he can, and sometimes he does and sometimes he doesn't, but he gives everyone a chance to make the right choice."

"Shepherd seems to think he's a story," Mal offered when she fell silent.

A soft smile curved her lips. "Aren't we all?" She gestured to the ship around her. "When we're dead and gone, and so are our children's children's children, and _Serenity_ is nothing more than a pile of rust and everything the Alliance worked to build has crumbled into dust, the only thing that will remain are the stories that people tell, about this time and about us. Stories are important, Captain, and sometimes they're more real than we give them credit for."

Her words hung in the air, heavy with a sense of foreboding that made speech seem unnecessary and almost sacrilegious. "What are you doing out here in the black, Miss Tyler?" he asked finally. Bluntness had always served him well in the past. He had no patience for philosophy, not when his crew's safety could be in jeopardy.

"She's looking for her mate," River said from just behind him. It took a great deal of Mal's control, but he managed _not_ to jump three feet in the air.

"_Quánnéng de shàngdì_(4), girl!" he exclaimed crossly. "Don't _do_ that!"

River was unrepentant. "Wolves," she informed him, "mate for life."

Mal frowned. "There are no wolves on _Serenity_."

"Alpha," she said, and pointed to Mal. "Packleader, denmaster, protector. Zoe is beta: enforcer. _Serenity_ is our den and the black is our range." She smiled at Rose like it was some sort of inside joke. "We are all wolves here."

Mal raised an eyebrow. "And where does your friend fit then, missy?"

"She has her own den," River replied as she wandered around the table, letting her fingers brush against the smooth wood. "A pack can only have one alpha pair."

"Well," Mal said as he stood. "This has been a delightful evening full of all sorts of crazy, but it's getting late. We're making planetfall at ten in the morning, relative time. You two want to get some sleep."

Rose didn't move, but she fairly radiated tension. "Should I be ready to leave?" she asked, her voice perfectly neutral.

"You paid for eight months in advance," Mal told her. "Leave your things where they are."

"One day," she called after him as he walked toward the hallway. "One day, Captain, I will tell you such a story."

"One day," he called back over his shoulder, "I'll believe you."


End file.
